


Hug Me Tender

by deanandsam



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Brotherly Love, Gen, Hugs, sam and dean - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-29
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-06-05 05:42:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 8,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6691900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deanandsam/pseuds/deanandsam
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A little series about the Winchester Hugs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. All Hell Breaks Loose

The tires screeched and the engine screamed as the young man threw the Impala into a U turn and drove like the damned he now was, back to his brother.

Dean was well aware that what he'd done was stupid and so, so wrong.  
It was something he himself had suffered through when his dad had done the very same thing for him, and he was sure if Sam ever came to find out what lengths Dean had gone to in order to save him, no--- to resurrect him---, his little brother's reaction would be exactly the same as his own had been; a profound sentiment of anger and grief that Dean would be tortured in Hell for all eternity.

Oh, he understood only too well, but this was Sam! He had to do it.  
His baby brother had always been his responsibility and Dean had felt him die in his arms, his last earthly breath exhaled against Dean's skin!  
No! That was a memory he wanted to banish from his mind, never to be allowed back in.

 

A small part of the reason that had pushed him do this was egotism, Dean was entirely aware, but he just couldn't envisage life without his little brother by his side.  
He couldn't bear the thought of Sammy dead, and he'd sold the only thing of any value he possessed, his soul, to save him.

 

Had it worked?  
The Impala sped even faster, as if she too shared the urgency in her owner's heart, the need to see if the youngest member of their little family was hale and healthy again.  
Dean shot out of the car like an arrow from a bow and pushed his way into the rickety house where he'd left his brother grey and dead on a filthy mattress.  
"Sammy," his heart cried out, "please, please, be alive."

If it were not so, and Sam was still lying unmoving on that bed, then, when Bobby eventually returned to see what had become of them, there would be two bodies for him to burn.  
He'd stretch out beside his little brother and his gun would do its gruesome duty.  
Bobby would be the only one left to mourn the brief existence of Sam and Dean Winchester.

 

He gave himself a second to calm down before he opened the door to the bare bedroom  
Sammy must never know, mustn't see him too agitated.  
Dean took one last deep breath and entered, but his traitorous heart, unheeding his orders, was instead beating like a battery of drums.  


His brother was there in front of him, living and breathing; his puppy-eyed face scrunched up in pain, but on his feet and blessedly alive.

 

Dean threw himself onto him, needing to hear the beating of Sammy's heart in synch with his own.  
He felt the tears starting to well up as he embraced him, but he pushed them back. There was no more need for tears, they were reserved for mourning the dead, no longer necessary now that he had his baby brother warm and alive in his arms again.

His mind registered Sam's yelp of pain and he instantly released him, not wanting to cause him more harm by pressing on his back, but at that monent Dean Winchester was the happiest man on Earth.

He'd sold his worthless black soul for a real live Sam. It was a steal!  
tbc


	2. Mystery Spot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This episode is usually seen as an amusing one but I've always found it to be highly dramatic, and the Winchester hug here is born from Sam's pain and despair, and that is why to me it's so powerful and with no fluffiness of any kind.  
> ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Wednesday! 

How Sam hated, loathed and detested the very word, even more than Tuesday, although that unholy day had made him suffer through the death of his beloved brother for more than one hundred times.

 

Said like that it slipped smoothly off the tongue, "one hundred days", but for three months, two weeks and two days he'd had no choice but to stand by and watch his brother die every single day, in the most inventive and painful ways possible, without being able to lift a finger to save him.  
Those Tuesdays had reduced Sam to a walking mass of tears and self-reproach but they were nothing compared to Wednesday; for that day was the one in which his whole world had fallen apart.

 

After discovering that the Trickster had been behind everything and had promised to make amends, Sam had been filled with such relief and happiness when he'd awoken the next morning to find it was no longer Tuesday but Wednesday, and that finally the vicious circle of Dean's deaths seemed to have ended.  
After months of pain there was light at the end of the tunnel.

He had believed that perhaps, in the meanders of the Trickster's heart a tiny shimmer of mercy shone, but it was not to be, for mercy had no place in the being's black heart.  
Dean had died for real that Wednesday, exhaling his last breath in Sam's trembling arms, outside of the Motel which had been their home for all those miserable months.

That day something in Sam Winchester switched itself off.

 

He'd sat in the parking lot crying and cradling Dean's body in his arms for hours until exhaustion took over and he'd fallen senseless onto his brother's body.  
When he'd come to, any traces of the young empathic man he'd been, had been wiped away, and a new emotionless Sam Winchester had risen like a phoenix from its ashes.

 

He'd carefully placed his brother's body in the Impala that he'd loved; a fitting funeral carriage to take him to his final resting place, at least until Sam could put right what had been done, and feel his brother alive in his arms again.  
He buried him in a patch of woodland.  
Dean would need his body once he was restored to life.  
There was no way Sam was going to burn it, he couldn't have done it anyway, he couldn't have watched as his big brother's body consumed itself amid the hungry flames.

 

The Winchesters had few friends, their life-style effectively isolating them from others, but even the few hunters they were passing acquaintances with would never see him again, not even Bobby, for Sam had only one thing on his mind; the Trickster.

He'd track him down incessantly until he found him and then he'd force the fucker to give him back his brother.  
There was no other option, no not quite, there was ONE other but he would reserve that until all other paths had been explored.

 

After six empty months of loneliness and despair, keeping his brother's memory alive with the plate of food he always put out for him when he ate the necessary to keep himself alive, Sam finally caught up with his prey.

He was ready.  
Well aware of the Trickster's penchant for deception, when he saw Bobby there, Sam's instinct told him that it wasn't truly the old hunter, though for one dreadful moment he'd believed it was.  
Sam didn't want to dwell on the idea that if it HAD been Bobby, it might not have made any difference!

 

The younger Winchester had gone over and over in his mind a million times exactly how everything would play out when he finally got his hands on the Trickster, but when he found himself there, all his bravado fell away and he became a little brother again; a little brother begging for the life of the one person he loved most of all, for his big brother; for Dean.

 

The Trickster's lesson had been of no avail, for whatever he'd thought to teach Sam, Sam didn't want to learn. All he wanted was his brother.  
Even a heart of stone couldn't have stood against Sam as he pleaded and cried for Dean, and the powerful being standing before him succumbed, albeit reluctantly, to the power of such unquenchable love.  
Instantly Sam found himself once more in the bed of torture where it had all began.

 

He looked across to where Dean was standing, and the few paces that separated them were covered in a second as Sam threw himself on to his brother, burying his face in the crook of Dean's neck, holding on for dear life to that which was most precious to him.

He hadn't see Dean for six months, six long, terrible, lonely months.  
This was not just a hug that he was giving his brother, it was a symbol of everything Dean meant to him.  
He couldn't breathe without him, he couldn't eat without him, he couldn't sleep without him, he couldn't live without him.  
He was nothing without Dean.

Dean remained stock still, unmoving, not speaking, allowing Sam to take whatever comfort he needed from him, instinctively understanding that his younger sibling had been deprived of his touch in some way.  
Dean would have stood there all day if that's what Sam had wanted.

When Sam did eventually break away, Dean could feel his baby brother's hazel eyes following him continuously while he picked up his few belongings and got ready to go, somehow afraid that if he looked away, his big brother would disappear.

Whatever had happened with Sam, and Dean knew that something terrible had, over and above his own repeated Tuesday deaths, because the hug that his baby brother had given him was of someone who had suffered the tortures of Hell and had been restored to the land of the living.

 

TBC


	3. Lazarus Rising

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is my favourite of the hugs for it was the longest and most intense, plus we got to see the emotions of both brothers

The blood-red inferno pulsed all around him. The sounds and sights of Hell filled his ears and eyes, from the screeches of panic emitted by the terrified new arrivals, to the low moans of those older souls who had acknowledged their fate; condemned to indescribable suffering for the rest of eternity.

Dean's soul had gone through all the stages of vocal expressions of Hell's pain, his screams and moans usually interspaced with his brother's name, as if calling for Sam would somehow alleviate his suffering, but Dean Winchester was never born to be a victim or to invoke clemency and pity, so in the end he took on perhaps the only alternative role in Hell that was open to the suffering souls; that of torturer.

He was getting ready to plunge his razor into the sinner on his rack, when his eyes suddenly found themselves contemplating the utter blackness that now surrounded him.

The bile rose in his throat.  
Was this some new torment devised by Alastair? Had he been demoted from torturer to tortured soul once again?  
Dean tried to move but there was no room.  
Panic started to creep up on him.  
Where was he?

 

He ran his hands down his body, stopping only when he felt the small bump in the right-hand pocket of his jeans.  
He feverishly pulled the object out, twirling it in his hand; it was a cigarette lighter, and with trembling fingers, he tried to click it.  
At the third attempt a feeble flickering flame illuminated the darkness around him.  
A box; a pine box. He was in a coffin!

What hellish trick was this?  
Dean took a moment to quell his panic and pushed a hand against the lid. The wood was soft and yielding under his fingers.  
It wouldn't take much to break through, but then the soil would fall in, suffocating him.

Well he couldn't stay here, so he had to go with the only available alternative.  
He broke though the lid using only the strength of his hands and then clawed his way to the surface.  
Luckily enough, the grave was a shallow one.

 

 

"Sammy," was his first thought. "Sammy has gotten me out of Hell. He didn't bury me deep on purpose. That's my boy!"

The image of his little brother energized him and with one last effort he pulled himself out of the damp soil, his face encountering the warm heat of the sun after the undefinable period immersed in the depths of the Pit.

He started walking, still not fully convinced that this wasn't some gruesome new Hell scenario, soon finding himself in the yard of a deserted gas station.  
Easily forcing his way in, Dean thirstily guzzled down some of the cool water he found in the fridge, the freshness of it manna to his parched throat after the scorching heat that had surrounded him for the past months, or was that years?  
His sense of time and space was a little hazy as yet.

 

Busty Asian Beauties! His lips formed their first heartfelt smile at the sight  
Hmm, maybe he was out of Hell after all. He didn't think Alastair would have bothered to stock up on his favourite magazine!  
Guiltily he pocketed the money from the cash register and made his way to the nearby phone booth.

"Sammy, Sammy, Sammy." was the fixed tam-tam in his head.

He tried his brother's old cell number but it resulted cancelled. He fell back on calling Bobby, but the old hunter didn't believe it was him, the phonr line vibtating with his threats and curses, so Dean did what he was best at, he improvised.  


There wasn't a car that Dean Winchester couldn't hot-wire and before long he found himself on Bobby's door-step.  
When the older hunter had finally been convinced of his identity by putting the younger man through all of his tests, Dean lost no time in doing what he'd been yearning to do since finding himself in that coffin, getting to his little brother.

There was nothing Dean didn't know about Sam, and in mere minutes he'd traced him to a motel not far from the burial site. This bolstered Dean's conviction that Sam was behind his escape from Hell.  
He must have stayed nearby to check that all had gone as it should.

 

Well, now Dean would pay his little brother a surprise visit.  
His heart swelled with longing and anticipation, he couldn't wait to see Sammy again.

Feeling uncharacteristically hesitant as he and Bobby stood outside the motel room door, Dean knocked, and when it was opened by a scantily-dressed, petite, dark-haired woman, he was about to turn away, thinking he'd mistaken the room number, but then his brother came into view. Sam in flesh and blood!

Heart beating like a jackhammer, Dean pushed his way uncaring past the anonymous woman, eyes only for his little brother, drawn to him like a moth to a flame.  
Perhaps if his concentration hadn't been wholly fixated on Sam, he'd have noticed the curled up black smoke nestling inside the pretty female shell. 

He saw the astonishment in Sam's eyes turn to suspicion and then fury, fury that some shape-shifter or demon would have dared to taunt him with a facsimile of Dean's body, but Dean just waited there unwavering, not moving, drinking in the sight of his baby brother, leaving it to Bobby to convince Sam of Dean's authenticity.

They stood there staring, eyes locked together, the joy of finding themselves truly one in front of the other overwhelming, the spell broken only by Dean's teasing words. " Hey Sammy! I know, I look fantastic, huh!"  
Like some well-oiled mechanism, the two brothers fell into each other's arms, drawn to one another by the same invisible force that had decreed their conjoined existence both in body and soul.

They held on tight, ever tighter until anything more would have decreed broken ribs, all the heartache and desperation of the past months healed by their reciprocal touch. The Winchester brothers were reunited, all was well with the world.

 

The demon, ensconced in the attractive female body, after offering some inconsequential remark about them being a couple, stole away. She was taken aback.  
How had Dean Winchester gotten out of Hell?  
This complicated her mission. It was a good job she'd had these past months to work on the younger Winchester, for with the distracting presence of the older brother, her job would be more complicated, but not impossible.

She smirked to herself as she exited the motel.  
Let the Winchesters enjoy their pathetic little reunion, she Ruby, would see to it that it was short-lived.  
TBC


	4. Exile on Main Street.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I think that this hug is very emotional even although it's practically one sided, but Dean couldn't have known that his little brother had been callously resurrected with no soul.  
> Dean's torment until the moment he glimpses his baby brother again.

Dean nursed his beer.  
To a casual onlooker he was merely a strikingly handsome young man enjoying a quiet drink with an old acquaintance before heading off home.

Nothing more, nothing less, but that casual observer would be way mistaken, for the young man was one of a kind; no, one of a pair, a pair of brothers who were now legend, if not among the majority of unsuspecting humans busily immersed in their daily lives, then in the veiled supernatural world that surrounded them.

The man plying him with questions about his past was one of those humans, viewing Dean only as the good-natured companion of Lisa, his next-door neighbour.

Sid could never imagine in his wildest dreams just what was hidden behind that pleasant exterior, he'd never be witness to the mass of pain, remorse, helplessness, frustration and yearning that was churning inside Dean Winchester; especially the yearning; the longing to be reunited with that part of him that was at this very moment undergoing unthinkable agony in the Cage.

Dean's heart and soul continually cried out for his brother, day and night; the nights were the worst for then he had no distractions, and his traitorous mind would itemise all the agonies Sam might be undergoing at Lucifer's hands. He tried his best to keep the images from flooding his brain, but regularly each night they would represent themselves, and the growing quantity of whisky he guzzled before climbing the stairs to bed, was never enough to give him one peaceful night's sleep.

He'd promised Sammy he'd go and live the apple pie life, but truly he'd never had any intention of keeping that promise; there were many vows he'd broken when it regarded Sam's welfare.  
Keeping a promise was nothing if weighed against the safety his baby brother.  
He'd lie to God himself if it would help Sam.

 

The problem was that he'd not been able to come up with anything remotely useful for rescuing his brother from Satan's clutches, and the fruitless search was eating away at him like a ghoul slowly chewing on his flesh.  
Dean just didn't know what more to do.  
There was no info about the Cage, for it had been designed exclusively to contain Lucifer, not as a place with an entrance and exit like the body of Hell its.

He'd thought about calling Bobby to see if he'd found anything, but the emotional impact of hearing the old hunter's voice would've been too much for Dean to take at this moment.  
He just couldn't have coped with Bobby's pity.  
Anyway Dean was certain if he'd had come across anything useful to help get Sam out, then he'd already have contacted him.

So caught up his thoughts, he barely felt the feather touch of the pretty waitress on his arm, but it was enough to shake Dean back to reality.  
She handed him the check, and he smiled ironically as he noticed the telephone number at the bottom, causing Sid to look on enviously!

How strange was it, now he had Lisa the women were throwing themselves at him like never before, now when even sex was no longer distraction enough to keep his mind occupied and sane.

 

The two men left the bar and said their good-nights.  
Dean was beginning to feel strangely dizzy when a shrill scream from a nearby renovation site grabbed his attention.  
He pulled out a gun from his car and entered the building.

Claw marks and blood!  
He made his way carefully though the old place but other than being nearly scared to death by a couple of pigeons, he could find nothing else.  
His senses had been put on alert though, and the next day he noticed more claw marks.  
Now seriously alarmed, he followed them to a garden shed where he nearly ganked the Glickman's Yorkie under the horrified gaze of his drinking companion Sid..

Dean managed to come up with a weak excuse about possums and rabies, but he was more shocked than Sid, for the Yorkie might not have been dangerous, but the yellow sulphur he'd found on the doorstep was a clear signal that something was going on and that he, Dean Winchester had better prepare for the worst. 

But the worst sometimes can't be anticipated and when he saw Azazel, complete with yellow eyes coming into Lisa's garage, he almost freaked out.

The demon had him in its powerful grasp, taunting him.  
"No, it couldn't be. He'd killed the demon himself", was the litany which repeated itself in his confused mind.  
He just couldn't take any more, and Dean welcomed the blessed darkness into which his brain plunged, just switching itself off.

 

As his senses sluggishly started to return, the first thing he felt was a painful sensation in his chest.  
It seemed as if someone had plunged a dagger into it, but the pain was magically forgotten as he saw what seemed to be the effigy of his brother, sitting watching him.  
Confused, he pulled himself up from the cot on which he was lying, eyes wide, as the image spoke.  
"Hey Dean."

Two simple words which Dean had never thought to hear his little brother pronounce again, but sometimes miracles did happen and if what he was seeing was true, then this was Dean Winchester's.  
He remained motionless on the cot just staring at Sam, afraid that if he took his eyes from him, he'd disappear.  
But Sam remained there and even bantered about expecting a hug or some holy water in the face.

Dean just kept on staring, motionless, a reclining statue in a dark shirt and blue jeans.

 

Stilling his throbbing heart, Dean managed to blurt out three words. "So I'm dead?" He was unable to comprehend how he could be with his brother if not through dying, but the very fact of his brother's presence made him wonder if he was in Heaven, because Dean's heaven is where Sam is.

"Are YOU real, Sammy?" Dean asked apprehensively, when his brother explained how the Djinn had poisoned him and tall he thought he'd seen, including Azazel was just a vision.

Sam assured him that he was, and lifting a bottle of holy water, put himself through all the standard tests to prove it, while Dean looked on, eyes brimming with unshed tears.

Hesitating until Sam finished the tests, Dean rose awkwardly from the cot, and the "Sammy?" that passed his lips was more eloquent than a thousand words.

"Yeah, it's me," Sam replied.  
Dean made his way slowly towards the brother he'd believed lost to him forever, his moist expressive green eyes professing all the love he felt for his sibling, and his joy in seeing him again.

 

Coming right up into his personal space while Sam stood still and unmoving, Dean threw himself onto his brother, pulling him in tight, his arms circling his neck, hanging on, never wanting to let go, ever again. He was so ecstatic to feel his arms full of real live Sammy that he wasn't conscious of the almost non-existent response from his usually so emo, kid brother.

Dean didn't yet know all the pain which would be reserved for them both from that moment on, and even if he had, there was nothing which could've ruined that perfect moment, when after a whole year of being without his baby brother, he finally had him in his arms again.

TBC


	5. LIke A Virgin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first part is from Dean's POV, the second from Sam's. 
> 
> Dean pays Death a visit and begs for Sam's soul while the younger Winchester wakes in the Panic room disorientated and confused.

The cluttered red-wallpapered room was occupied by a thoughtful Bobby and a hyper-tense Dean as they sat opposite one another around the antique desk, discussing the latest news bulletins.  
A small private plane had crashed in mysterious circumstances and Dean welcomed the distraction as it helped take his mind off that which was eating away at him, namely the wait for Sam to come out of whatever unconscious state he found himself in down in the panic room.

 

Dean's mind wandered back for a second to the incredible conversation he'd exchanged with Castiel a few weeks earlier, the night they were going to raid Crowley's lair.  
He'd found it hard to comprehend exactly what the angel was saying to him when he'd begun to ramble on about Sam's soul being better off left where it was in the Cage, as it was now possibly too shredded and mutilated to be rejoined with Sam's body.

Dean had been packing his duffel with the items he deemed necessary for the assault, and at first he wondered if he'd misunderstood what Castiel was saying.  
How could it be better for Sam's soul to remain in the Cage?  
Wasn't the whole Heaven / God thing about saving as many souls as possible, and so why was Cas advising him to leave his little brother's soul to the eternal mercy of an extra-pissed Lucifer, when there was a chance to free it?

 

Then he'd thought about it.  
Cas had never suffered the tortures of Hell.  
Dean didn't know if or how, angels were punished, and he really didn't care, but he was sure that if Cas had been tortured for one hundred and eighty years in the Cage, he'd have been more than happy to be pulled out, whatever state he'd been reduced to.

Dean had been there, and the nightmares came to him still. He just pushed them down in true Winchester tradition.  
"Ignore it and it'll go away, " was Dean's motto, but that didn't work for everyone.  
It didn't apply to Sammy for instance, who would brood and agonise over things unendingly.

In any case, Castiel be damned!  
Dean was getting Sammy's soul out of Hell even if there was only a thin strip of it left.  
Whatever happened after that was always preferable to suffering at Satan's hands for all eternity.

 

Castiel's words had come back to mind again when he'd lain himself down on Dr. Robert's cheap table, waiting for his sadistic nurse to send him off to the afterlife for a meeting with Death himself, and he found them as illogical logical now as before.  
Cas was wrong. Dean would get his brother's soul back, come what may!

 

There wasn't much Dean was afraid of, certainly not of dying.  
He'd "been there done that "so often that he'd lost count, but the physical embodiment of Death himself scared the crap out of him.  
The memory of those hollow cheeks and sunken eyes made him tremble to the toes of his boots.

He swallowed his fear.  
This was for Sammy after all, and a stand-off with Death would be more than worth it to get his soul back.  
He missed his puppy-eyed brother so much it hurt, and though he knew it wasn't Robo-Sam's fault that he was such an uncaring dick, it was imperative to get his own Sam back.

So with that in mind he pushed down his fear and pride and begged Death to give him back his brother's soul.  
The choice the powerful being had proposed between saving Sam's soul or Adam's had given Dean no hesitation.  
"Sam," had been his prompt answer.

 

He felt sorry for Adam, but there was no way he'd ever have chosen him over Sam.  
Dean didn't know for sure what was going on in the Cage but he was ready to bet that Sam was the one taking all the punishment. After all Adam had agreed to being Michael's vessel and it certainly wasn't his fault that Michael and Lucifer had ended up in the Cage, so why should they have it in for him at all?

 

Dean had been literally flabbergasted when Death had volunteered to rescue Sam's soul even though he'd failed to carry out Death's job for the allotted twenty-four hours.  
If Dean had been able to pluck up the courage, he'd have hugged the spectral being, but the very idea was enough to make him quake and shiver.

 

 

Later when he'd rushed down to the panic room and seen the beauty of Sam's splendid sparkling soul, he'd been overwhelmed with love and pride for his brother. Dean wondered about his own. He was pretty sure it was much blacker than Sammy's, which even after one hundred and eighty years in the Cage, was still as white as the driven snow.

 

Death had explained the whole 'wall' affair to him and knowing Sam, Dean realised it would be the Devil's own task trying to keep his curious little brother from searching for answers. But he'd deal.  
It was just one more responsibility to add to his big brother hand-book, and zero compared to having his beloved brother back.

 

 

Dean's mind returned to the present.  
"Dean, boy! Are you listening to a word I'm saying?" the older hunter chided.  
"Sorry, Bobby but, well you know…..."

Bobby just nodded, but in that instant Dean heard a feeble voice calling his name, a voice that no longer sounded like that of the overconfident Robo-Sam, but the scared voice of his little brother calling to him, needing his big brother to assure him that everything was alright.  
Dean was almost afraid to turn around in case what he saw wasn't what he needed to see, but as the footsteps came slowly closer, he cautiously stood and was immediately swept up into the familiar embrace of his little brother, an embrace he'd been bereft of for eighteen barren months.

He felt Sam's arms tightening around him as if he'd never let go, while Dean's own found their natural place around his Sasquatch's broad shoulders.  
A sensation of completeness washed over him as he desperately hung onto Sam and he understood that the bond between them went beyond their understanding, spilling into something almost spiritual. 

Whatever it was, he was in no rush to find out. Having Sammy back was enough.  
They might bitch or argue or even throw punches, but there was no way in Hell they'd ever be separated again.  
Dean Winchester would see to that, and Dean Winchester's word was his bond.  


::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::  
Sam's POV

He surfaced nebulously into consciousness, his thoughts jumbled, fleeting images and memories slipping away frustratingly like those dreams or nightmares which seem to dissolve instantly as your mind awakens, and which you try to hold on to unsuccessfully before they melt completely away.

Sam tried to open his eyes but his eyelids felt as if someone had attached two concrete blocks, making their opening a feat beyond his meagre forces, snapping them shut again like two elastic bands tugged too far apart.  
He tried sending a bolt of energy to his hands, and managed to move them clumsily, like a robot jerking its extremities for the very first time.

His long fingers curled awkwardly around the edges of the bed. No, a cot!  
The cogs in his rusty mind were staring to turn again.  
Cot equals panic room!

That's where he must be, but to verify it he had to open his uncooperative eyes, all the strength in his weary body hardly enough to perform such a simple act.  
As they creakily opened, his surroundings came hazily into focus and there was no mistaking the circular iron room.  
Sam could never forget the hours, no days, he'd passed locked in here, the pain and hallucinations of the prolonged withdrawals from his demon blood addiction, terrible, frightful and unforgettable.  
He hated this place with all the passion of his young heart, and yet his destiny kept pulling him back to it as if the very room itself was a drug he was a slave to.

 

Now that his mind had started to collaborate once more, it flew towards that with which it was inexorably linked. Dean!  
Where was his brother?  
He wasn't at his side, for if he had been, he'd already have been fussing over him, his husky voice assuring himself of his little brother's well-being.  
So he was alone.  
Well, it wasn't the first time he'd languished abandoned in here.

 

His brain urged his limbs to move themselves, but he was just so tired and his muscular body just so heavy, but his mind and heart insisted he move his ass and go find Dean. He was flooded with an overwhelming need to see his big brother, to feel him.

It felt like years since he'd last set eyes on his sibling, but that couldn't be, for he was lying in Bobby's panic room and so Dean must be somewhere nearby!

He brought a hand to his face studying its form, uncertain now.  
It looked normal, young, not aged or gnarled as a old man's would, then why did he have this feeling of ancient, of years having gone by without sight or touch of Dean.

 

Wryly he wished Bobby had a crane attached to the ceiling, one that could pull up his hefty uncooperative body from the cot, but there wasn't, so he put all his efforts into swinging his "long freaky legs" as Dean scoffingly called them, over the side and pulling his upper body into a sitting position.

Reality swirled around him, leaving him once again uncertain if what his fuddled brain was registering was authentic or not.  
For some reason he didn't seen to be able to distinguish the difference any more.

 

Dean! He had to get to Dean!  
His big brother would make everything right.  
Dean loved him. Dean was his brother, mother, father and best friend all rolled into one.

Dean! Dean! Dean! and with that one word reverberating in his mind and heart, Sam pulled his wobbly body to its feet and stumbled towards the open door, wondering why his every movement seemed so stiff and unfamiliar, as if he hadn't used his body in years and had forgotten how.

He felt himself becoming a little steadier whilst he made his way through Bobby's basement, and when he arrived at the bottom of the flight of stairs it didn't seem that climbing them would be as difficult a feat as he'd expected.

He listened for a moment.  
Everything was quiet except for the murmur of voices from above.  
He recognised the gruff gravelly tones of his brother and his heart filled with joy.  
Dean was upstairs, he wouldn't have to wait more than a minute to see him.

He climbed the stairs, his heart beating ever faster, the need to see, to touch, to feel his brother's live body in his arms had become an overwhelming necessity that blinded him to all else.

He stationed a moment in the library doorway.  
Dean was sitting at the desk, his back to Sam, talking to Bobby.  
The older man saw him first, his eyes widening with an expression that Sam couldn't quite decipher, unsure if it was happiness or caution but he didn't care.  
He had no wish or time to analyse Bobby's gaze.

His eyes were only for his brother as the elder Winchester, alerted by Bobby's gasp of awareness, turned slowly around.  
Dean's eyes met his and Sam didn't care one hoot how girly it sounded but the sight of his brother was the most marvellous thing he'd ever seen.  
While Dean got to his feet, Sam made his way towards him, his paces no longer insecure but steady as a rock, leading him home to his brother.

He threw himself onto Dean with all the weight of his powerful body, crushing him to his chest, his head fitting exactly into the curve of Dean's neck with the accuracy of a piece of a jig-saw puzzle, cut to conform there precisely.  
He sensed Dean's confusion at first, as if his brother wasn't quite sure how best to react but a second later Sam felt the strong arms surround him and pull him into his embrace.

They hung on to one another.  
Nothing else mattered.  
Whatever it was that bound them together, be it their simple brotherhood or something beyond this reality, was of no importance.  
Their love and joy at each other's existence flowed reciprocally between them like a two-way electric current, curing all their pain and sewing together the pieces of their torn hearts, making each brother whole again.  
TBC


	6. The Hug That Could Have Been.  s7.02 'Hello Cruel World'

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is 'a hug that should have been' but didn't happen on the show so I wanted to fix it.

As if he had a pack of hellhounds on his heels, Dean violently pushed open the warehouse door, his Sammy sensors telling him his brother was in all kinds of trouble, but the last thing he expected was to see Sam waving a pistol at him.

He perceived the confusion in the wide green eyes as he moved slowly forward into the room. Sam was peering at him as if he was a ghoul or a shapeshifter of some kind.  
"Sammy?" Dean murmured softly, trying to soothe the uncertainty he saw reflected in the confused gaze. "It's okay man, I'm here."  
Puzzled, Sam looked to his side, to something only he could see, for to Dean the warehouse was empty but for them.

"I know," Sam answered panicked, his eyes practically rotating in their sockets. "I came here with you!"  
"Sam, I just got here. Whatever you think you were seeing, it's not real." Dean assured him  
Sam waved the gun about again, not trusting his perception of the facts.

 

He was like a spooked horse and Dean understood that he had to calm his brother down quickly.  
He held up his hands as if in surrender.  
"Look Sam, no gun. Put yours down. If you think there's two of us, then you wouldn't want to kill the wrong one now, would you?"  
Sam seemed as if he was going to fire off a clip anyway just for precaution, but then he slowly lowered the gun, allowing Dean to come up and stand in front of him.

 

"Hey man," Dean began as if he was talking to a frightened child. "You think there's two of us here and you don't know who's real?" 

Sam just watched nervously as Dean reached out and pulled Sam's hand into his own.  
"I've been to Hell too, Sammy and I know its pain is different from Earth's. It's the pain of the soul, while this," he declared as he pressed his thumb into the wound on Sam's hand. "Is of the body."  
Sam flinched at the hurt, but Dean kept his hand steady. "This is real, Sam. I'm the Dean who sewed it up," he swore earnestly. "I'm your true blood brother. Whoever else you're seeing in here is a crappy fake!"

 

Sam stared at his brother in bewilderment, wanting to trust; hoping that the Dean who was causing his hand such pain was the real one, and he felt the beginnings of hope building up as the Lucifer image started to flicker out.  
"Sam," Dean ordered as he saw the wide green eyes focusing on some image behind him. "Look at me! Trust me! I'm going to be your stone number one and you're gonna build a friggin' pyramid on top of me," he declared firmly. "Believe in me!"  


He let go of the tortured hand and with the easing up of the pain, Sam saw Lucifer starting to reappear.  
In panic, his long fingers went to his palm and started to dig into the wound where his brother had just removed his own blood-speckled ones, and to his relief, when the pain returned, Lucifer vanished.

"Dean, it's really you," he whispered hopefully, eyes fixed on his brother, their hazel depths filling with certainty.  
Dean smiled and he went with " the one and only, Sammy!" trying for normal, but his heart was heavy for what he'd just witnessed.

He felt as if an emotional atom bomb had nuked him, as he gazed at his little brother. Just what had he done when he'd allowed Sam to take that leap into the Cage.  
It had seemed the best thing to do at the time but what had he condemned his baby brother to?  
He knew in his heart that if he had the chance to go back and repeat the whole thing, he'd have stopped Sam from doing what he did.

They would have found another way, and if not, then the whole crap world could just have gone up in flames, but Sam HAD thrown himself into the pit and now they'd have to deal.

 

The sight of his gigantic little brother who at the moment appeared all of five years old, looking at him in open adoration as if Dean was his saviour and could right all wrongs, made the older sibling's legs move forward of their own volition and he felt his arms rising as if directed by some puppeteer's strings, to wrap themselves around the kid.

He pulled him into a hug, a hand going to the back of Sam's neck and directing his shaggy head down into the hollow of his shoulder. He could feel the fine tremors shaking Sam's body and he tightened his hold.  
At first Sam seemed to resist but then he relaxed into his big brother's arms as he'd done since he was old enough to understand and recognise the unique scent of Dean.

 

His brother was an enigma in many ways, Dean mused, basking in his brother's nearness.  
Sam had always been a gentle child, sweet and giving and yet he was also an exceptional hunter, though he'd never have picked that life for himself if he'd had the choice. Thing was, Dean thought sadly, Sammy had never had the luxury of a choice and for that matter, neither had he.

He felt Sam burrow in closer and he tightened his hold, chick-flick moments be damned. There was no-one here to see; Sam needed him and he needed his brother.

Anger washed over him as he remembered what the being he'd once likened to a brother had done to Sam, bringing down his wall to prevent them from following him.  
It had been an evil inhuman thing to do.  
Castiel,could have come up with a thousand ways of stopping them, yet he had purposely hurt his gentle little brother, allowing all his Hell memories and those of what he'd done while soulless, to be released.  
It was a true paradox that Death, who was supposed to instil terror into the hearts of men, had been more considerate than the angel; going into the Cage, getting Sam's soul out and providing him with a wall.

Sam stirred in the circle of his arms but Dean still clung on. If holding on to Sam like this could give his brother comfort, he'd stand here until doomsday if necessary, for he knew that once outside this warehouse, they would only find more strife, unhappiness and worry.

"Dean," Sam murmured into his shoulder. "I'm okay now."  
"You sure, Sammy?"  
"Yeah, I think so."  
Dean nodded at the words, but before releasing him, he whispered. "I'm gonna let go, Sammy but know that I'll always be here for you little brother."

He stepped away from Sam but his eyes never left him.  
"We're brothers Sammy and nothing is ever gonna come between us. And if Lucifer shows up again you just tell me and I'll kick his bony ass."

Sam cracked a watery smile.  
Dean was his. There was nobody in the world he'd rather be than Sam Winchester; Lucifer and the Cage be damned.  
He took his place at his brother's side as in complete synch they walked towards the door and to what they'd find beyond it, secure in the warmth of their brotherly bond.  
TBC


	7. A Born-Again Hug. A hug that could have been.

Anger coursed through Dean's veins like molten lava, but there was no one he could take it out on because it was directed solely against himself.  
His fisted hands were itching to smash into something, anything, to reduce the tension in his body and if there had been a wall nearby, he'd have punched it, accepting the pain of bruised flesh and bone as a just punishment for his sins.

When the call had come through from the clinic, Dean had been caught completely unaware.  
Sam had been knocked down by a car and he was in hospital, in the psych ward!  
Just what the Hell was going on?!  
Dean tried to ignore the little voice in his head insistantly whispering that he knew exactly what was happening to Sam.  
It was the part of him which had gone into denial when his little brother had told him about his difficulty in sleeping; that his 'hellucinations' were getting stronger; that Lucifer was ever more omnipresent in his mind.

Dean recalled how in the warehouse a few months earlier, he'd exhorted his brother to trust him, to look on him as stone number one.  
How could he have let this happen, how could he have so blatantly ignored the signs of suffering all too clear on his little brother's face and in his half-hearted denials of “I'm fine, Dean.”

Dean understood why. He just hadn't want to believe that Sam would really get to the point of breaking, preferring to hide his head in the sand ostrich style, hoping if he ignored what Sam was going through, it would magically disappear, but it hadn't, and now his little brother was in a Mental Institute!

 

As soon as he found himself alone in the driver's seat of the Impala however, all Dean's anger dissolved into tears, hot bitter drops that fell unashamedly on to the wheel.  
He wept for Sam, for himself, for Bobby, for all those who had died because they'd had the misfortune to encounter the Winchester brothers. He cried until it seemed that all the liquid in his body had exited via his tear ducts, the bodywork of the car shielding him momentarily from the outside world and from what he'd soon have to face.

 

But the tears had been cathartic and he raised his head in pride, remembering who he was.  
He lifted his chin in defiance, he was frigging Dean Winchester, Sammy's big brother, hunter extraordinary and he'd fix this. It wasn't too late! It couldn't be!  
It was his job to look out for Sam, he'd make this right but if he couldn't and Sam went down, he swore that this time there would be no soul-selling, no tricks, he'd simply follow his baby brother to wherever he ended up.

He wouldn't kill himself, for he didn't want the excuse of suicide to get in the way; no, he'd leave the method of his death to the first monster that came along. Revving up the engine, at peace with himself, Dean aimed the Impala towards his brother.

 

Peering through the glass panel inserted in the door, Dean could see Sam lying immobile on the bed and he felt something shift in his belly. How a six-foot five man could resemble a five-year old child was unexplainable, but that was how Sammy appeared to him.  
His little brother looked so lost and hopeless lying there alone and Dean felt all his big brother genes coming preponderantly to the fore.  
Soon he'd have Sam back at his side where he belonged!

 

They say that hope is the last to die and that was how it felt to Dean as he made his way to Emmanuel's house. Perhaps this time the Winchesters would get a break, perhaps God was out there somewhere after all and was feeling charitable today.  
His hunter acquaintance Makay had told him his blind eye had been cured by a faith-healer.  
Dean knew the hunter was a practical man, not given to flights of fancy, so he had every reason to believe him.

Nothing came easy though, he mused as he quickly dispatched a demon that he'd unexpectedly found at the at the healer's front door.

 

A noise at the bottom of the steps drew his attention and he glanced down at the person who was standing there.  
To Dean it felt as if the only two emotions he could still express were either anger or grief and when he recognised the being staring up at him, anger got the upper hand; a seething, simmering, gelid anger.  
Standing there calm and collected was the one who had condemned Sam to die, the one who had coldly and unnecessarily shattered Death's handiwork.  
THIS was Emanuel? THIS was Sam's last hope? The very one who had caused it all!  
He swallowed his ire as the man studied him with no recognition at all in his eyes.

 

Outside the hospital Dean waited impatiently as Castiel went forward to take out the demons which had gathered there, each of them hoping to have the honour of capturing an angel to bring back to Crowley. And not just any angel, but the one that had double-crossed the King of Hell.  
But Dean's mind was too occupied with the salvation of his little brother to pay more than a casual attention to the destruction playing out before his eyes. His only interest was getting past the demons to his brother

 

When by Sam's deathbed, Castiel informed the older Winchester that he could do nothing because Sam's wall had crumbled to dust and there were no bricks left to rebuild it, Dean stared at him in disbelief.  
"You broke his wall now you gotta fix it," was all that came to his lips. "You told me back then that when it was all over you'd mend Sam!"  
If angels could cringe, Castiel would have done so under Dean's gelid scrutiny, the Winchester's intense eyes pinning him to his responsibilities, but the angel's face showed no emotion as he pondered the problem.

With a sudden flash of insight he came up with an idea.  
"I can't rebuild the wall," Castiel confirmed. "But I can try to absorb Sam's memories of the Cage. It should at least help him to get up and about. I'm sorry, I should never have done this to Sam."  
Dean didn't bother answering, he had nothing to say, no wish to engage in conversation with the one who had reduced Sam to near death. He felt emotionless, cold, having already made his decision earlier in the Impala. If Sam died then he'd follow.

 

Looking on in silence as the red rivulets of Sam's hellish visions made their way up the angel's arm coming to rest in his eyes, reducing them to two pieces of fiery coal, no words of encouragement passed Dean's lips.  
  
In relief he watched, as the lines of pain that had been etched on his brother's face smoothed themselves out and when Sam turned his eyes towards him, the tiny spark of hope that shone there, made Dean come alive again.

 

"Sam," he uttered falteringly, not sure whether to celebrate just yet, while his body propelled itself around the bed towards his prone brother.  
"Dean," Sam answered.  
Sam could express a thousand different emotions in that one word, and this time he was asking for his big brother, wanting Dean near him, something that Dean was all too willing to do.  
"Sammy!"  
Although Dean would never admit to it, he was no different to his sibling as far as expressing emotions through the simple voicing of his little brother's name was concerned.

Sammy needed him and Dean answered his call like a sailor to a siren.  
It was the call of blood, of brotherhood, of the shared danger of a life spent together, of fights and pranks, of abandonment and loss, of everything and nothing, all culminating in this; Dean and Sam; Sam and Dean.

Ash had said they were soul-mates and Dean recalled how he and Sam had stolen a glance at each other, embarrassed, but he had no reason to doubt Ash's words for what he and his brother shared was so powerful that it would outlast Heaven and Hell.  
He opened his arms as Sam threw himself into his embrace. He could feel Sam's heart beating furiously, his body still tense with fear, terror that he'd been on the brink of death, that he'd no longer see Dean.  
Sam burrowed into him, his large body somehow fitting seamlessly into Dean's smaller one. They held on to each other, to the only anchor they had in the tempestuous ocean of their lives, oblivious to anyone other than themselves.

 

When they finally walked out of the hospital, Dean felt whole again, the one person in the world he truly loved was by his side, relatively healthy. He could ask for nothing more.  
Two pairs of green eyes met over the roof of the car as they had done many times before, the unspoken sentiments transmitted from one to the other as strong and binding as ever.  
The end


End file.
